In many cases of medical treatment, in the field of cancers for example, minimally-invasive interventions and minimal surgical interventions on a patient are increasingly replacing the classical surgical operations. A decisive factor in such cases is a good anatomical and functional medical imaging, especially of soft tissue. The previous mobile C-arm X-ray devices with fluoroscopy imaging are not sufficient for this, since these only deliver a two-dimensional image representation, no adequate soft tissue resolution and no functional medical imaging. It can also occur that the X-ray power is too weak to achieve a sufficiently good image quality with more complex interventions.
Computed tomography (CT) is an imaging technique which has long been known which offers outstanding image quality especially in relation to anatomy and soft tissue resolution. For better positioning of patients within a gantry, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,940,941 B2 for example, a mobile CT gantry has been proposed in the CT field which can be opened up in order to better position the patient. However functional imaging is not possible with CT alone.
Nuclear medical imaging methods are especially suitable for functional imaging. Known examples of such methods are Positron Emission Tomography (PET) which is very well suited to functional diagnosis but delivers poor anatomical images. A typical PET system is described in US 2003/0014132. As part of a PET examination a radioactive tracer is injected into the patient. The tracer, for example FDG, collects explicitly in organs and/or tumors and allows a good diagnosis of the metabolism and thereby the discovery of tumors and metastases.
SPECT (Single Photon Emission Computer Tomography) related to PET also delivers functional imaging. A SPECT system is disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,638,817 for example. A radioactive tracer is also injected into the patient in a SPECT examination. The tracer, for example 99 mTC-Methoxyisobutylisonitrile, collects explicitly in organs and/or tumors and allows a good diagnosis of the metabolism and thereby the discovery of inflammations, tumors and/or metastases.
Since PET and SPECT deliver only poor anatomical imaging but CTE delivers good anatomical imaging, the use of a combination of a PET device or SPECT device with a CT device, frequently also referred to as PET/CT or SPECT/CT has become established. An integrated CT-PET system is described in DE 103 39 493 A1 for example.
The known hybrid systems are however not suitable for use in minimally-invasive interventions, since access to the patient is very restricted.